Moral - Meta ethics

Question 1

What is cognitivism?

Answer 1

• Moral judgements express cognitive mental states, e.g. beliefs
• They aim to describe reality
• Statements can be true or false

Question 2

What is non-cognitivism?

Answer 2

• Moral judgements express non-cognitive mental states
• They do not aim to describe reality
• They are not capable of being true or false

“Boo! Murder!” “Don’t torture animals!”

Question 3

What is moral realism?

Answer 3

There are mind-independent, external moral properties and facts – e.g. “murder is wrong” is a moral fact because the act of murder has the moral property of wrongness

Question 4

What is moral anti-realism?

Answer 4

Mind-independent moral properties and facts do not exist

Question 5

Outline moral naturalism

Answer 5

Mind-independent moral properties exist as natural properties that are intended to be true or false (moral realist + cognitivist)

“Murder is wrong”
- expresses cognitive belief
- wrong is a natural property

Question 6

Outline utilitarianism as a form of moral naturalism

Answer 6

• Reductive:good can be reduced to psychological property of happiness, bad can be reduced to pain (natural brain properties)
• Mill’s proof of utilitarianism: happiness is the good and the only good since other desires provide the ultimate end of happiness

Question 7

Outline VE as a form of moral naturalism

Answer 7

• Non-reductive
• Ergon/function argument: can be interpreted as a discussion of natural facts, as it can be argued it is a natural fact that the function of humans is to reason, like the function of a knife is to cut

Question 8

Outline the naturalistic fallacy against moral naturalism

Answer 8

Moore argues it is fallacious to equate goodness with a natural property

He argues that while pleasure and happiness are closely correlated, they refer to 2 different kinds of properties: natural and moral (this invalidates Mill’s proof since he concludes happiness (natural property) is good (moral property)) - can’t jump from natural to moral

Question 9

Outline Moore’s open question argument against moral naturalism

Answer 9

It is an open question to ask
“Is pleasure good?”

However if good is the same as pleasure (as claimed by naturalism), the question would be closed since it would be asking, “is pleasure pleasure?”

Question 10

What is moral non-naturalism?

Answer 10

Mind-independent moral properties exist as non-natural properties that are intended to be true or false (moral realist + cognitivist)

“Murder is wrong”
- expresses cognitive belief
- ‘wrong’ refers to non-natural property; non-natural properties cannot be reduced

Question 11

Outline Moore’s intuitionism

Answer 11

Moral realist, cognitivist, moral non-naturalist theory that claims we know about non-natural moral properties through rational intuition; directly reflecting on the moral truth behind statements. Truth/falsehood of moral statements are self-evident

Question 12

How does Hume’s fork attack moral realism?

Answer 12

Moral judgements are not relations of ideas, nor are they matters of fact, therefore moral judgements are not judgements of reason

Question 13

What is Ayer’s verification principle as a criticism against moral realism?

Answer 13

For Ayer, a statement only has meaning if it is analytic or empirically verifiable - if a statement lacks these then it lacks meaning

“Murder is wrong”
Not verifiable or analytic
Pain of murder doesn’y make it ‘wrong’ (hence no naturalism)
Can’t prove non-natural properties like intuition (hence no non-naturalism)

Question 14

Outline Hume’s is-ought gap against moral realism

Answer 14

Hume distinguishes moral and factual statements: moral statements express what we ‘ought’ to do while factual statement express what ‘is’ true or false

Ought statements are non-cognitive
Is statements are cognitive

Therefore we can’t derive ‘ought’ moral statements from ‘is’ factual statements

Question 15

Outline Mackie’s argument from relativity against moral realism

Answer 15

Cultural variation in moral beliefs cannot be explained by realism - if mind-independent moral properties exist, they should be objective. Has one culture got moral reality? Or have cultures got different ways of life and their morals reflect that?

Question 16

What are Mackie’s arguments from queerness against moral realism?

Answer 16

Epistemic queerness - how would we gain knowledge of moral facts if they exist? How do we know stealing is wrong?
Metaphysical queerness - moral properties would have to be unlike anything else, with a metaphysical built-in ‘to-be-doneness’

Question 17

Outline Hume’s belief that moral judgements are not beliefs since beliefs alone could not motivate us

Answer 17

Emotions and desires always motivate us, and reason (cognitive judgement) cannot motivate action. E.g. “it’s monday” does not motivate action compared to “i don’t want to be late to class,” and “giving money to charity is good” so moral judgements must be non-cognitive

Question 18

Outline the criticism that anti-realism can’t account for how we use moral language

Answer 18

Emotivism: non-moral language can be emotive and influence peoples’ attitudes, such as adverts,

and sometimes we don’t always aim to influence others when making moral judgements,

plus moral language is not always emotive since moral discussion can and should be dispassionate

Prescriptive: we don’t always prescribe; we complain, confess…

Question 19

Outline the argument from moral reasoning against moral anti-realism

Answer 19

People embed moral judgements into statements e.g. “if murder is wrong, then paying to have someone murdered is wrong,” why would people do this if the statement can’t be true or false?

Question 20

What is the criticism that anti-realism can’t account for moral progress?

Answer 20

If there is no moral reality, then moral views can’t get better or worse - however views have clearly changed

Progress is becoming more rational in thinking, not more correct therefore talk of moral progress is non-cognitive since the notion of good or bad progress is relative to the observer

Question 21

Outline the issue that anti-realism leads to moral nihilism

Answer 21

If anti-realism is true, it will lead to moral nihilism (the view that no actions are inherently wrong and thay there’s no truth behind ‘murder is wrong’) which would the raise the question of why anyone bothers to be moral at all